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February 23, 2013

Newport By-election sensation

The Newport by-election of 1922 was similar to the present Eastleigh by-election in many respects. Jayne Bryant explains.

The Newport by-election of 1922 has gone down in history as the only one to lead directly to the fall of a government.

In 1918 the Tory-Liberal Coaliton won a landslide election victory with 472 MPs. The death, in September 1922 of the Liberal Coalition MP for Newport, Lewis Haslam, prompted a by-election. Commenting, the South Wales Argus remarked that:

“Mr Haslam’s qualities were not on the surface. He always seemed a little remote, he lacked humour. He was not expansive in manner or outlook. He had none of the arts of self-advertisement. To use a common phrase he ‘could not put the goods in the shop window’.”

Like many MPs at the time, Haslam did not live in his constituency, but in Bignor Park House in Sussex.

In the years between 1918 and 1922 there were nine by-elections in Wales before the Newport contest. With the exception of Ebbw Vale, which Labour won uncontested, each had a Government and an opposition candidate.

However while the Conservative and Liberal leaderships agreed not to put forward a candidate, Newport’s local Conservative Association went ahead anyway. They selected Reginald Clarry, director of Dyffryn Steel and Tin Works in Morrison. They disputed the national agreement to put forward joint Coalition candidates, declaring that it was only ever meant to have applied to the 1918 election. Senior Newport Conservative, Sir John Wyndham Beynon, declared, “The Coalition is dead, it has failed in its objectives to provide peace and stop the rise of Socialism”. Consequently, he said, the real choice was between Conservatives and Labour.

The Newport Liberal Association also rejected external efforts for a Coalition Liberal candidate . The local party approached many notable members who declined before choosing the reluctant Lyndon William Moore

Moore was the Deputy Chair of Newport Liberals, a solicitor and coroner for Newport. He was an advocate for women’s rights and equality, in favour of proportional representation, pro business and for minimal public expenditure. The Liberal slogan became ‘Moore for Newport and Newport for Moore’. However many historians describe him as ineffective and out of his depth.

The Labour Party reselected their 1918 general election candidate, John William Bowen, General Secretary of the Post Office workers union. Many expected a Labour win - similar to the earlier Pontypridd by-election.

The campaign revolved around squabbles between the three parties over whether the election should be held on the old electoral register or a new one. One contemporary account noted that the availability of alcohol was a key issue for Newportonians. The Labour and the Liberal candidates were non-conformists who had their meetings in the Temperance Hall while the Conservative candidate had the support of the Licenced Victuallers Association.

National issues also came to the fore with the potential threat of war with Turkey over the ‘Chanak crisis’. All candidates in the Newport by-election were keen to distance themselves from the increasingly unpopular Coalition Government.

The Conservatives won the election with 2,090 votes (6.2 per cent) over Labour - and without any official support from the Party nationally – with the Liberals coming far behind in third.

The Newport result was unique in that no candidate supported the Coalition Government. It was also the first by-election in which there was a genuine three-horse race. Although the by-election didn’t cause a general election in 1922, with the Cabinet having already decided to call one 12 days earlier, it did have a significant impact.

Lloyd George didn’t visit Newport during the campaign, nor did he issue any statement however the result fatally damaged the Coalition Government To the Liberals the Newport result proved that Conservatives couldn’t be trusted as Coalition partners – they would always put the interests of their party ahead of the Coalition. The result was a disaster for the Liberals who have been the third party in British politics ever since. For the Conservatives the lessons would be long-lasting. They reconnected with the grassroots of the Party and the 1922 committee was formed.

Clarry won the seat again in the general election a month later, this time in a straight fight with Bowen in which he gained 54 per cent of the vote. Clarry kept the seat until 1929 when it was lost to Labour. He regained it in 1931 and kept it until his death in January 1945. Bowen later became the MP for Crewe between 1929-31. Moore never stood for Parliament again but did become the leader of the Newport Liberals on the council until he died in 1935.